INFLUENZA IN HAWAII.
Previous to the year 1889 Hawaii had been tolerably free from the “Flu.”
Such cases which had appeared in former years were of a mild character,
as were also those which prevailed during the 1889–90 epidemic. Epidemic
Catarrh has been known in the Hawaiian Islands for many years. The
Annals of the early Missionary Fathers mention it.
Dr. Alonzo Chapin, an early Missionary physician, refers to it; on page
39 of the Author’s “Monograph on Leprosy,” is the following quotation
taken from the Doctor’s writings in the years 1836–37: (in Hawaii)
“Diseases occur epidemically, as was the case with Catarrh, repeatedly.”
This epidemic catarrh was probably Influenza in a mild form; or it may
have been the epidemic catarrh of the kind known to the physicians of
today, as that caused by the Micro-coccus Catarrhalis, a globular or
spheroid shaped micro-organism.
South Wind Catarrh: In Hawaii during the season when the South wind
prevails, from November to March, epidemic and infectious colds are very
common. They are attended with disagreeable frontal headache, nasal
discharge, sore throat, fever, aching limbs and body; these are cases of
mild “Flu.” Elderly people, middle aged and old foreign residents, and
our Aboriginal population are those mostly affected.
Hawaii today, due to great increase of travel, greater speed of ocean
steamers, and its cosmopolitan population, is probably infected, like
all other ports of the U. S. A., with several different species or
strains of the Influenza Bacillus, and also those of the Micro-coccus
Catarrhalis.
_Contagious Nature of Colds or Catarrhs, so Called._
It is a well known fact, that when isolated peoples are visited by
strangers, whether they arrive by sea or land, epidemic colds speedily
appear amongst the residents of these localities.
The Esquimaux, Indian tribes, residents of South Sea Islands, Caroline,
Marshall and Marquesa groups, Pitcairn Island, etc.; isolated peoples
and out of the track of travel, when visited by strangers, become
affected with epidemic catarrh and cough, which may attack great numbers
of them and cause high mortality. Those visitors who carry the germs of
the Catarrh show no visible signs of disease themselves.
Possible sources of Disease: During the past four centuries there is
clear evidence that Hawaii has been infected with diseases from certain
sources; there is also evidence that is not so clear, yet it is worthy
of consideration. From what countries could ships carry diseases to
Hawaii before the opening up of the Islands to foreign trade? Spain,
China, Japan and Russia. Since the opening up of the islands to foreign
commerce, the ships of all nations have carried to Hawaii a varied
assortment of diseases, some nearly harmless, but others of the
deadliest kind.
In the past centuries there are credible records of Spanish visitors,
also of Chinese and Japanese, and of a people coming in Praus and Junks
with “tufts of hair on their faces,” Formosans, whose speech has an
alliance with the Malayo-Polynesian and hence Hawaiian.
At the present time numerous ships which visit Honolulu carry infectious
and contagious diseases amongst their crews and passengers, especially
those who travel in the steerage.
What occurs today at known intervals on a very large scale, most
probably happened on a smaller scale at extended and unknown intervals
in past centuries; diseases were introduced to Hawaii, and carried from
here.
Castaways and shipwrecked mariners can carry diseases to the shores they
arrive at, the same as other voyagers, and probably did so to Hawaii.
If there was no Tuberculosis in Hawaii before the coming of the
Foreigner, then where do the ancient Hawaiian words “hookii,” “akepau”
come from? Hookii means, in English, to grow thin in flesh, to waste
away; akepau means to consume, to finish, hence to eat away.
Even today inspection of arrivals from oversea ports, and even limited
quarantine carefully carried out by competent officials, is not always
an effective protection against the introduction of infectious and
contagious diseases into any country.
The following list of contagious and infectious diseases eluded the
Quarantine officials at the port of Honolulu and infected the town, some
later infected other Islands of the group.
Year. Month. Disease.
[1]1853 May 13. Small-pox.
[1]1881 February 4. Small-pox.
1895 August 22. Cholera.
[1]1899 December. Plague.
1911 February 23. Cholera.
1911 October 27. Yellow Fever (?)
[1]1918 June. Influenza.
Footnote 1:
Spread to the other Islands of the group.
THE EPIDEMIC OF 1889–90.
The 10th Pandemic which had its origin in the month of March, 1889, at
Bukhara, Russian Turkestan, ultimately reached Hawaii, both from Japan
and San Francisco: from the former country in August of that year, and
from the latter city in December.
Influenza became epidemic in the Islands in the year 1890, in the months
of January, February, March and practically ceased to exist in the
latter part of April. Its morbidity was extensive, its death rate almost
nil.
Extract from the Report of the President of the Board of Health to the
Legislature: session of 1890.
“Early in the autumn of the year 1889 a disease started in Russia, which
on that account took the name of the Russian disease.”
It spread rapidly over Europe and the British Isles; very soon it
crossed the Atlantic, and with extreme rapidity spread over the whole
continent of North America.
Early in January, 1890, Dr. Trousseau, the port physician, reported many
cases existing among passengers, on the mail steamer en route to the
Colonies.
In its journey westward from its initial starting point in Russia to the
confines of California, its march has been marked by great prevalence
and fatality.
In Hawaii with its mild and salubrious climate, its intensity is greatly
modified, and although it caused great distress and physical suffering,
very few deaths have resulted from it. This disease has prevailed as an
epidemic on several former occasions under the name of Influenza. Other
extracts from the same Report are as follows:
Agent Reynolds, “Influenza has visited most of the families in town
since its arrival, but deaths have been few.”
Dr. S. B. Swift, “At Kalaupapa, females at the Bishop Home were most
affected.”
Dr. Jared Smith, Kauai. “Extreme prevalence of Influenza of mild type,
began the middle of January.”
Dr. D. Campbell, Waimea, Kauai. “Influenza widespread.”
Dr. Greenfield, Hamakua, Hawaii. “No Influenza epidemic. Catarrh and
Bronchitis; wet and cold weather.”
Dr. G. Herbert. Wailuku, Maui. “One-third of the population affected: at
least 3,000 cases. One Pneumonia case fatal. Symptoms: Fever, frontal
and occipital headache, spinal and limb pains. Pulmonary congestion and
occasionally Pneumonia.”
Estimated number of cases of Influenza:
Island of Oahu 6,500 Population 28,000
〃 Maui 3,300 〃 〃 19,000
Deaths in
Honolulu
February 3
March 5
—
Total 8
EARLIER ARRIVAL OF INFLUENZA.
(Hawaii invaded from Japan.)
On or about the 20th of August, 1889, recently arrived Japanese laborers
had Influenza in a mild form.
This shipment on arrival from Japan, at Honolulu, were transferred
immediately from the ocean steamer to the deck of an Inter-Island one,
and were landed direct at Onomea and Hakalau plantations.
The type of Influenza was very mild, never infected other laborers;
those who had the disease were segregated for a week.
At Onomea there were nine cases, at Hakalau eleven. (Author.)
The epidemic of 1890 left a trail of its own, somewhat different from
the way it had acted as an epidemic; for almost a decade cases of the
nervous type frequently kept cropping out; these were attended with
Insomnia, great prostration, severe neuritis and facial neuralgia;
frequent attacks and relapses in the intervals, of this Nervous form of
Influenza, were responsible for the decease of Honolulu’s most prominent
physician in the year of 1894.
The last, and fatal attack, the Doctor believed he acquired from
visitors to Honolulu from Siberia, that country and European Russia
being a continuous source of Endemic Influenza.
DENGUE.
Dengue in its initial stage or degree of progress in some respects
resembles the Flu, and is often mistaken for it. Such was the case in
the years 1900–1901 when imported laborers from Porto Rico, W. I.
carried the Dengue or Breakbone fever with them.
This disease has practically disappeared, a sporadic case of it comes to
light now and then. Its transmission by the Mosquito, Culex fatigans, is
not yet definitely determined.
A new and more virulent type or species of the Influenza Bacillus was
carried overseas to the port of Honolulu in the third week of June,
1918, and spread to the residents of the town; and it was this new
imported type of Influenza that was responsible for the high mortality
in the epidemics of that disease in 1918–1920, due to Influenza and
complicating Pneumonia, the so-called Pulmonary or Pneumonic form of the
disease.
All these matters have been fully described in the public press, and in
part in the Reports of the Board of Health, which q—v.